Feb. 8, 2010

Results

 By Weston Ackerman
Athletic Media Relations

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - The indoor track and field team took another step forward while putting together another strong weekend at the New Mexico Classic last weekend at The Albuquerque Convention Center.

The highlight of the meet was the distance runners but the team as a whole did a lot of growing according to Head Coach Brian Bedard.

"I thought the distance runners ran particularly well," Bedard said. "We have a young team and I saw some people growing up on the track. We had a couple freshmen that looked pretty good."

On the women's side Tanesha Johnson and Kendra Gerk posted season bests in the 60-meter dash (7.69 seconds) and 3,000-meter run (10:18.69) to finish fourth and fifth, respectively, in their events.

All told, the women's team boasted 13 top 10 finishes including Gerk (17:52.99) and Ellie Rastall (17:57.95) finishing third and fourth in the 5,000-meter run, Sonni Russell (1.63 meters) and Olivia Downing (1.58) coming in third and sixth in the high jump and, Serena Johnson (16.91) and Leah Elmshauer (16.62) notching fourth and fifth place in the weight throw competition.

It was a similar story on the men's side with 16 athletes placing in the top 10 of their events. Kelby Dias finished fifth in the 60-meter hurdles (8.25), in the 300-meter run Jake Keyser (8:41.83) and Andrew Roberts (8:45.47) finished fifth and sixth, respectively. Also finishing back-to-back in third and fourth place were John O'Neill (15:16.08) and Andre Lesser (15:25.52) in the 5,000-meter run, and Ryan Billups (14.43) and Travis Smith (14.12) in the triple jump.

"We've really talked to the athletes about trying to learn something from every meet they compete in, not make the same mistakes again, trying to get better," Bedard said. "I see us progressing and moving that way. It's just continuing to build and trying to learn from mistakes and good performances and trying to build on those."

Next up for the Rams is a split-squad weekend with athletes traveling to the Husky Classic in Seattle, Wash., and Colorado Springs, Colo., for the Air Force Invitational.